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Friday, September 10, 2010

We want major health care reform! But don’t change MY health care policy. Stop socialistic government-run health care! But keep your hands off MY Medicare. No new taxes! But fix the roads in front of MY house and hire more teachers for MY kid’s school and put more policemen on MY beat. Don’t raise the deficit! But get ME a stimulus-money job. No government regulations! But make sure MY breakfast eggs are safe. Reform Social Security! But don’t change MY benefits or costs. Bring our troops home, the war’s bankrupting us! But let’s bomb Iran! Shut the border down! But don’t deport MY gardener. America welcomes all religions! But not Muslims, so let’s get a bunch of Christians together and threaten to burn Korans in a true Bonfire of the Stupidities.

It’s an old, old song heard whenever Americans get unnerved by events. It’s incoherent and filled with fear-generated divisions, long simmering resentments and bone-deep religious, racial and economic hatreds. While the song comes from the American heart – hypocritical and a-historical to the core, the knives always there just under the carefully burnished, smiley-faced surface – it is always roused into full voice by opportunistic political choirmasters and master demagogues manipulating the singers and the song for their own profit and power.

And when the last note dies, the result of all the sound and fury is almost always a nation filled with self-inflicted bullet holes shot through a great many feet, loud wails of anguish, and a HUGE transfer of wealth into the bank accounts of the select wily few. Which sets us all up for the song cycle to repeat itself, the problems unsolved, the lessons unlearned, the connection between words and music a complete blank.

But the run-up to this particular election is not without its delicious moments – little operatic solos and riffs and delicious subtexts and wrong notes.

Consider the ironies of multi-gazillionaire (EBay) Meg Whitman running for California governor on a platform of business know-how and fiscal-prudence while spending like a drunken sailor --$104 million of her own money so far. This to buy a chance to govern a financially busted state polarized by gerrymandering and locked into a furious refusal to seriously change the way the state taxes, budgets and spends its money. Or Carly Fiorina, who, as CEO of Hewlett-Packard, downsized and outsourced 30,000 jobs before getting fired and walking away with a big fat bonus. She’s now running for senator as a job-creating business leader. And while the Koch brothers (oil and gas) are pouring money into opposing a California green alternative energy ballot measure, Exxon Mobil (oil and gas) just invested $300 million in a San Diego green alternative fuel company that will benefit from that same ballot initiative. Does anybody have a program here? How do you spell cognitive dissonance, anyway?

And then there’s the richness of the subtexts and symbolism of the leading notes of this song cycle. Take Joe Miller from Alaska, the newest tea-party-ish darling du jour. Is that carefully clipped quasi scruffy semi-unshaved permanent five o’clock shadow the result of careful two-day-growth manscaping like the macho undercover actors in the new TV series “Dark Blue?” Or an overdose of testosterone that keeps him running around the northwoods in big-check flannel shirts hauling moose antlers by the armload?

Well, no matter. In the upcoming Fox Noise/Republican/Tea Party 24/7 FearFearFear! congressional campaign – Nonexistent headless bodies in the Arizona Desert! Deadly Killer Mosques at Ground Zero! Black helicopters coming to kill your Grandma if ObamaCare comes to your town! Communism creeping over America that can only be stopped by Glen Beck who’s now speaking for God while raking in the filthy lucre of mammon! (Buy gold, now!) – what better subliminal message can a candidate project in these ginned-up scary times than an image filled with moose antlers, five o’clock shadows, the whiff of chain-saw engine oil and buffalo check plaid? Photo shoot, styled-up Momma and Poppa Grizzlies coming to protect us. Yes. America is saved!

And if nobody wants to seriously talk about choices and consequences, if nobody has the patience or foresight to work for long-term goals or put in place real reform that actually results in, well, real reform, if nobody will support efforts that will lead to a transformative payoff in the future by changing parts of a system that simply aren’t working anymore, then style over substance, image over content is about all that’s left.

So, here it is. The word to fashionistas --Flannel. Better stock up now.

Very well put, Ann. Great post. I don't think we've ever dealt with something that amps the fears of the ignorant with the ferocity of the the (entirely foreign-owned) Faux News.

Glenn Beck and his fellow crybabies nearly started a new global war this week by encouraging that media-whore pastor in Florida. (Hey, he might have killed more Americans than those guys did on 9/11. Yay!) Sometimes I wonder if that Saudi prince who's part owner of Fox Noise isn't doing all this to destabilize the US and recruit for the Taliban.

It is my right as an American to suffer and die on my own, without any help from anyone unless it's a charity. That kind of help is okay because it makes me feel grateful and not (horror of horrors!) ENTITLED.

Isn't Filthy Lucre a good enough reason? If you happen to find the rhythm on the drum that gets the masses marching why not fine tune it. Money for nothing. And you don’t get Oil splashed on your suit and /or robes.I wager that the subliminal "buy this car" works just as well on many who watch le Fox just to be outraged by it.

Frankly it is legal and an allowed use. Cordova center etc… not buying it, as an accidental choice of A Name. A caliphate conquered city in Spain? Beautifully constructed a that. Come on. I’m not following it closely but if THAT is it’s proposed name then this is an indication of (cultural ignorance on the part of every non Muslim USA citizen involving in this debate (and present on Either side, and yes Insulting Ignorance). I would prefer to see a debate on the name changing.

Tide is rising in the Bay, but the wind is picking up too much, still ok for kayaking, but choppy …Keep typing

As a person born is Israel, and with not much sampling, I consider Al Gazirra to have better production values, and in areas where they don’t have a “partisan” interest (Obvious bias or outright lies) to have better reporting. Example; they had easy to understand graphics for the gulf oil spill (Our Gulf).

The history of India is of Mosque building on the sites of Holy but abandoned temple ruins followed by the incensed Hindus running a pig through that or a different mosque and over and over again without intervention by extra-Indian foreigners. And not necessarily in that order of instigation.And that’s from Dr. Rose PhD India and Pakistan History studies some score and nine years before 9/11.

What about the Missionary Killings in Afganistan recently. Why did that happen?

Aside from Fiorina being voted one of the worst CEOs in America by Money magazine, my brother in law, a twenty year HP employee, advises me that California could get a better Senator using a lottery. Whitman on the other hand made gadzillions of money running a company that produced... nothing. It's main employees were the users themselves, in other words they payed for the privilege of working for her. California, you are sooo screwed.

Moonbeam Brown has already been Governor and as Attorney General real did help the people of the State of California, especially those in Los Osos. I guess he really likes to work for the government of, by and for the people. If Meg actually is a globalize at least she understands how it works. While Jerry personally, never has met a payroll, has he?

Fiorina would be a breath of fresh air compared to tuckered out old Boxer. Anyone who watched the debate knows that, unless you are an elitist that thinks that Roe v. Wade and her pocketbook is more important than your own. Vote Boxer because she demonstrated such leadership when the Feds turned off the water to the central valley.

WM: "If Meg actually is a globalize at least she understands how it works. While Jerry personally, never has met a payroll, has he?" The only payroll Meg made was at the helm of a company that produced nothing and the vast majority of it's "employees" were it's own customers (EBay) Fiorina is the definition of carpetbagger, A terrible record of management with nothing but the backing of the anti Obama camp to show for it. In this case I believe its the devil you know thats better.

Alon sez:"The history of India is of Mosque building on the sites of Holy but abandoned temple ruins . . ." The history of ALL religions is to build on the displaced ones, i.e. Christmas, churches built on pagan shrine sites, & etc. That's the nature of the beast, co-opt when you can, kill when you can't.

and sez:"Cordova center etc… not buying it, as an accidental choice of A Name. A caliphate conquered city in Spain?"

Compare life for Jews and Christians in caliphate Spain with life for Jews and (suspected non-catholic) christains in Spain after the (Catholic) reconquesta. Ditto the level of learning at various caliphate learning centers etc. Can you spell Torquemada? Conversos? Expulsion? Dark Ages, redux?

Sandra sez:"It is my right as an American to suffer and die on my own, without any help from anyone unless it's a charity. That kind of help is okay because it makes me feel grateful and not (horror of horrors!) ENTITLED"

Exactly. This is the question of the Commons that we've been quarreling about from day one. What do each of us want to be entitled to for being a part of this society? What do each of us want to be responsible for to be a part of this society? The Mayflower folks wrote a compact. We also have a compact. But it's something that has to be renegotiated constantly as times change, and guarded carefully lest thieves manipulate the fine print, steal assets and bankrupt the country. That's what elections are all about -- how do we balance our personal freedoms with the requirements and entitlements of our negotiated social/citizen compact, a compact with one another that should result in a reasonably civil "civilized" life.

Well, we have a great deal of concordance, Churadogs. But I’m still not buying it. What's in a name?Why not Isnani Tawil center? Is the American consulate building in Mexico city called “The Alamo”?Cordoba has a specific meaning (Caliphate expansion) to Islamic Fundamentalists, particularly to those who wish to export it rather than in direct simple reaction to the threat of globalism to their traditional way of life (ref Afghanistan). And it has the EXACT same meaning as understood by peace loving Americans of the Muslim faith who would be content to continue to live here as a respected cultural/religious minority (reference “Irrelevant in their silence”). Just because a Faux Bobbing head grabs on to an “Issue” does not negate the possibility or certainty of an element or the entire issue.The Caliphate at it's peak was a period of learning, creation in math sciences and tolerance of minorities, and included a respect for the works of past and then current cultures and works. That lasted a while, and eventually deteriorated, to be replaced. The Ottoman Imperialist Power when transitioned by European Imperialism, left the maps (International boarders) of the Middle East and beyond, a Royal mess. Istanbul- Straddling East and West? It's not only religion and it's not only economics and its not only the west's fault. It is what it is.

Jewish and other minorities flourished in that golden age of Cordoba. Perhaps a global caliphate established 300 years from now would also usher in a world of tolerance and respect. PAX ROMANA followed a messy ROMA VICI. (not a scenario I necessarily envision anyway, but with too many people on the planet and diminishing resources, peacefully stable alternative universes are not in the cards, unless Malthusian factors are first fully exercised in an Appocalipso)

Right now America is under threat inside and out. The threat I am most concerned with is the internal one. (Not that; Domestic terrorism is no more, no less a threat than it was 12 months ago); The threat of perpetual ignorance fed by the politics of division, and maintained also by liberal smug allinclusionisem that is disrespectful of the xenophobia that is inherent in some cultures. (Pragmatism- a religion that says; only do what you can). Currently this is an election season; So the creation of the “Other” is in high swing.Add to that, Joran Van Der-Sloot is behind bars.

Separating ReligionEconomyPoliticspPychology? Killing Missionaries is easy. Keeping out cultural (Economic) influences that threaten the religiocultural intertwined way of life, is hard.That is why those twin churches of Mamon and Power in New Amsterdam were targeted, Nine and perhaps 11 years before that.Unlike the color palate of plaid Flannel shirts available this season, the choice of naming the “Cordova Center” did not pass through the sloppy process of marketing and “focus group” selection. Out in the ROW (Rest of World). A soft drink that raises your spirits may also have the unwanted consequences of awakening the ghosts of your ancestors. You simply may not want to bite on the wax tadpole. Explain “Cordova center” in Spain, where words fall mainly in the plain, and a “Chevy Nova” is a no-go preposition.

No coincidences. Just let them build it. “Whoever” “We” think “They” are. We wrote it in our “Compact”. The compact that defines US, USA.

As I'm writing, Stars and Stripes are playing as USA kicks Istanbuly hiney in Basketball. Bet Joran can spell “Bosporus”.And don’t send them home early. Teach our children, that history is re-written every day and with every new victor.

Alon sez:"Cordoba has a specific meaning (Caliphate expansion) to Islamic Fundamentalists,"and sez:""The Caliphate at it's peak was a period of learning, creation in math sciences and tolerance of minorities, and included a respect for the works of past and then current cultures and works."

As I understand it, the NY cultural center is headed up by Sufis, who are not considered fundamentalists, so perhaps they chose the name "Cordoba" because it had the same meaning to them as the ones you list -- comity and progressive thinking (directly above) and were not viewing it in the fundamentalist way (you mention at top)?

Sufis are a easier to get along with bunch within the sects and divisions of Islam, by my recollection. I was not aware that the protection money that the Saudi's pay in the form of mosque building included that sect. But it still comes down to education and cultural recognition. While the Crowds incited to riot in Karachi are getting most of their world knowledge from only a couple of sources, most educated people of the middle east and beyond are vary aware of the ethnic/religious tensions and of the symbolic value of specific words. Including how others would think. Being that their lives do depend on it. A Lebanese would be a good nationality to ask. Why would I think that a Lebanese Maronite Christian would know more about the divisions of Islam than a Islamic third generation American?Because they have to. What color bandana not to wear may be more important over here.It would be nice if there were a Chanel or two that carried international and national news. Even the state sponsored news in many nations is reliable. Several times a day. Probably be interesting to try it 24 /7... wonder if they could keep the public informed without needing to keep them entertained. You know..News. Like they used to make it the old fashioned way, from scratch. Not the news that YOU want to hear, not told by people who remind you of the best friend you never had. Just the news that's Important.

Alon sez:"It would be nice if there were a Chanel or two that carried international and national news. Even the state sponsored news in many nations is reliable. Several times a day. Probably be interesting to try it 24 /7... "

Try BBC America. Also PBS nightly news and their Friday "newsmakers" panel discussion is always low-keyed and covers various points of view without screaming or infotainment.

Calhouns Can(n)ons

About the Can(n)ons

Calhoun's Can(n)ons was originally published in 1990 in the (now defunct) Morro Bay, CA, Sun Bulletin, and since 1992 has continued in the various resurrections of the Los Osos, CA. Bay News, Bay Breeze, Bay News, Bay News-Tolosa Press. A few years ago, the Can(n)on was added to the Central Coast NewsMission blogsite. Ann Calhoun lives in Los Osos. You can email her at Churadogs at gmail dot com

To be persuasive, we must be believable. To be believable, we must be credible. To be credible, we must be truthful. Edward R. Murrow

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No one is exempt from talking nonsense; the misfortune is to do it solemnly. Montaigne